We heard about the bad weather you were having as my SIL's flight back to Scotland from Bangor was cancelled. Couldn't connect to Philli. All Ok now though I hope?. Our weather here in SW France was awful last week as well. Big Storms and Hail that took out a lot of maize and grape crops. Not good.

I don't know about the southern part of the eastern coastline, but just rain here in Boston. No big deal. I have made it through Nor'easters, and I can survive hurricanes. By the time they get up this far north, they are just storms of breezes with some rain.

Losing crops is not a good thing. Does that mean the price of wine will go up in the future?

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Illegitimi non carborundum!
I don't want my last words to be, "I wish I had spent more time doing housework"

I put my head phones on and listened to the whole two hours of the concert. The announcer did a great job of explaining why we revere our flag so strongly. And I had to laugh at the one who tried to sing The Star Spangled Banner. I have never heard it sung with a British accent. One thing he forgot to mention was that it was taken from an old British bar song. The lyrics were purely American, the tune British.

I have it earmark for listening to it again. Thanks for sharing. For those of you who didn't listen to it, give it a shot. Yeah, it is two hours long, but well worth it. I dang near busted my bladder because I didn't want to put it on pause.

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Illegitimi non carborundum!
I don't want my last words to be, "I wish I had spent more time doing housework"

Not sure Addie about the price but the quality of the wine in this area may not be a 'vintage' year. France has many regions though so a lot should be OK .Losing the maize is worse I think because it is now too late to re-sow and a lot of the smaller farms grow it for animal feed in the winter or for Bio-fuels which can be a big part of their income. We'll just have to wait and see but when hail is the size of golf balls in that kind of storm you can imagine the damage that can be done in 10 minutes can't you? We were not too bad here, we lost our old apple tree as it fell down but have managed to rescue our beautiful Banksia rose that grew up in it. T has made a wooden frame for it now. Nothing when you compare it to other folk's problems though.

The loss of winter feed is a major problem. I always feel bad for farmers when the weather is against them. We don't get hail in these here parts too often. But down south they certainly do. The last place I would want to be in a heavy hail storm is in a car. I have seen where it can just smash the windshield into pieces. Only once did I ever get caught in a hail storm. The hail was big enough to pound holes in your body. Fortunately I was close to home and ran my short little legs off.

I don't know how Arthur was down south, but up here in New England, it just petered down to nothing to write home about.

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Illegitimi non carborundum!
I don't want my last words to be, "I wish I had spent more time doing housework"

I put my head phones on and listened to the whole two hours of the concert. The announcer did a great job of explaining why we revere our flag so strongly. And I had to laugh at the one who tried to sing The Star Spangled Banner. I have never heard it sung with a British accent. One thing he forgot to mention was that it was taken from an old British bar song. The lyrics were purely American, the tune British.

I have it earmark for listening to it again. Thanks for sharing. For those of you who didn't listen to it, give it a shot. Yeah, it is two hours long, but well worth it. I dang near busted my bladder because I didn't want to put it on pause.

Glad you enjoyed it, Addie. The Star Spangled Banner guy did say something about a glee club with met at the Crown & Anchor Inn in The Strand in London and their song "To Anacreon in Heaven", the song that the music of "The SSB" was taken from.

The programme's announcer had a lovely voice.

On the subject of patriotic songs and their tunes, I sometimes think I can hear the whirring sound of George Washington spinning in his grave when I hear "My Country 'Tis Of Thee", which is sung to the tune of "God Save The Queen" (the British National Anthem). It seems that the writer of "My Country....Thee" didn't know that.

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__________________Don’t look for the light at the end of the tunnel. Stomp along and switch the bl**dy thing on yourself.